17/09/2023
THE XL BULLY IS A HUMAN BEHAVIOUR PROBLEM!
In the words of Rishi Sunak regarding the XL Bully...
"It is clear this is not about a handful of badly trained dogs, it's a pattern of behaviour and it cannot go on..."
Correct, this is a pattern of behaviour - A HUMAN ONE!
From BREEDING, DEVELOPMENT, ENVIRONMENT, TRAINING and HANDLING, we influence and engineer everything in a dogs life. From how they are bred, the conditions they are bred in, how they develop, how they are trained, methods and tools trained with, the environment they develop and grow in, how they socialise, when and what they eat, where and when they are allowed to walk, where they sleep. You name it we influence it. And that includes genes.
S***m can be delivered as quick and as simple as a Just Eat take away to a bi***es uterus.
Pop up canine fertility clinics all over the UK churning out pups. Pups born and into incubators they go, as the health of the mother is of no concern, it doesn't matter if she struggles to breed naturally, or if she struggles to whelp, its all about the money.
Pups pimped out on loan contracts/payment plans to inexperienced homes to avoid the tax man and licenses, as long as the breeders can make money on the litters of those pups and the new HUMAN is happy with their new designer trend. Win win for the HUMANS involved.
Pups ears mutilated for fashion and appearance, ears cropped, sometimes by scissors and without anaesthetic! Here in the UK, under the smokescreen of importation.
HUMANS breeding all different shapes and sizes for the sought after, high demand trend, of the next unique colour and sold to the highest bidder. Doesn't matter if high inbreeding is used to do this, as long as its the biggest and the best looking dogs produced in their line, job done.
We all see the emojis of 🔥🔥🔥🦍🦍🦍, and the claims of never been seen before. Yet we have seen it before, we see it constant! The same HUMAN drival out these money obssessed breeders mouths with no actual care for the dogs health or temperament, all for looks and money!
There is no care if the dog is off to the right lifestyle, the right home and environment, or the right experienced and committed handler or family for that pup, its all about the money!
We then have pups that haven't had the proper development with mum and litter mates. Those pups who are then given up when the dog hits adolescence, as the owners can't cope when they have a big bouncy, heavy, teenage dog who needs the right mental and physical stimulation. They only now realise the time can't be committed to training and the dog who has now outgrown the cute puppy stage, doesn't suit their lifestyle. A time when the dog really needs stability and security the most, when the human and dog relationship impacts their behaviour greatly. A time when they are experiencing strong emotions but lacking the abiltiy to regulate these emotions and struggle with their impulse and frustration. Taking longer to recover from stressful experiences, and overall they tend to need more energy to control these emotions and recover from daily stressors and yet off they go to face high emotional turmoil and a mountain of stress, never getting to switch off! It's ok though, as long as the HUMANS are fine.
So the cycle starts of the dog bouncing around multiple homes. Sold online and delivered or collected that same day yet again as simple as a take away. The dog now growls in the new home that night because he is stressed, anxious or fearful of his new surroundings and the new HUMANS towering over him. This is communication in the dogs world but yet goes unheard or punished. Or he doesn't get along with the new resident dog, because his stress levels are rising. No one can understand him needing space, they can't read him, he can't switch off, and get's no decompression. So again, the cycle continues, further jumping to the next hands and home, continuing until we see the frenzied and fuelled media headlines of....
"Families Devil Dog Bully Mauls Child"
"Evil Bully Turns Out the Blue and Mauls Family"
"Killer Bully Mauls on Street"
When in fact the dog has never known a stable family, he has never known stability throughout his development, he has infact only been in the current home for a few days or a few weeks, bought by Joe Bloggs around the corner after living the life above, into yet again, another strange environment, with strange people, left alone with small unpredictable HUMANS who make peculiar noises, who do not have the cability to read his body language. The responsible adults who should be looking out for both dog and child are not.
The others who stay in the one home after god knows what kind of breeding and development, who hit adolescence but can't be heard. Behaviours suppressed. Signs ignored. Socialisation not done. Overwhelmed with stimuli and then factor in all of the above. They escape onto the streets, ending up in incidents. The ones off lead and out of control without owners present or owners lack of concern, the ones who end up as strays in rescue pounds serving their 7 days awaiting their fate - the fault lies with HUMANS every step of the way.
Any or a combination of these factors can create a stressed, hyperviglant, and easy to startle dog. One who is quick to react and living in a state of survival. One who is living on edge and cannot emotionally regulate as the well balanced dog with the stable ubringing.
From the moment the dog is a thought on the breeding scale to inside the womb, to the moment an incident happens, it is the HUMANS who are responsible. And these are the lucky dogs. It has been known for these dogs in the wrong hands to be injected with HUMAN growth hormone to get their bulk, and even given the drugs He**in and Co***ne. It is a HUMAN BEHAVIOUR PROBLEM.
🧬🧬🧬GENETICS🧬🧬🧬
"THEY ARE BRED FOR AGGRESSION"
"THE XL BULLIES TRAIT IS AGGRESSION JUST LIKE A LAB OR A SPANIEL'S TRAIT IS RETRIEVAL"
"THE XL BULLY IS BORN AGGRESSIVE, IT'S IN THEIR DNA".
And more statements like the above, with the most recent being spread like wildfire is the Kimbo article. Lets delve into genetics and a "Killer gene."
Genetics are more complex than the statements above. They are a part of one source of info which is present from the dogs outset of life, when thinking about instinctive behaviour or what we call “inherited” through evolution. How the dog survives to reproduce etc. Behaviour has evolved morphologically alongside and under the influence of natural selection but for our modern dog we HUMANS stepped in and started messing that up. The dogs when born come with their evolutionary genes, their blueprint of their body and other genes come into play throughout development, and then it gets messy through a whole load of other factors in their domesticated life that we created. That we HUMANS engineer.
On an evolutionary level, it is a change in allele frequency over time. Anytime theres a change in the nucleobase, that can change the allele frequency and when u have that mutation that’s how evolutionary change of a species happens (we can then go into amino acids/proteins that are coded for etc.). But this is where it gets way more complex than just statements flung out as above.
Environment, external factors, internal factors - hormones, stress, metabolism etc. Can all affect the expression of genes, which in turn effect the changes - EPIGENETICS. However, evolution happens over a long period of time, and we are talking about a sped up version of HUMANS interfering with selective breeding in regards to the XL Bully.
We had it with the Pitbull, and having had experience of those who raised them to fight in the pits and studying genetics as well as the bloodlines of those who bragged and liked to shout about the “real dogmen", there are many many factors at play when these pups are born that can make it look like they have "game" or "born aggressive", such as when they are in the womb, the placement of the pups in utero and how this effects hormone levels, how the mother was throughout pregnancy, hormones and adrenaline present, stress levels, metabolism, the environment, the communication at play between HUMAN and canine, the list goes on. It's a lot more than throwing just genetics at the equation and "what's in the blood!"
When we consider how genes affect behaviour development, that behaviour represents the functioning of the nervous system and none of that can be manifested until the nervous system is in place, so much of the behaviour we do study, (even in the studies of the scientist's trying to look for an aggressive gene) is seen when they are out in the adult world and far removed from the development stage. And in those studies the SNPs (single-nucleotide polymorphism) associated with breed differences in behaviour, fell into genes that were expressed in the brain and involved in pathways related to the development and expression of behaviour and cognition. It was thought in some studies they could have been identified as having potential to influence behavioural processes through altered expression in the brain, or contributions to other biological processes involving the nervous system. But all conclusions pointed to breed being a poor indicator of individual behaviour, and there are many individual differences within a breed than across different breeds.
So again not as straight forward and it takes us to epigenetics, where we would want to know the influence of environmental factors, socialisation, development, critical development stages, and each and every factor at play.
With epigentics a dog can influence the DNA they pass on to their offspring depending on their experiences of the world, and how their behaviours and environment can cause changes that affect the way their genes work. Unlike genetic changes, epigenetic changes are reversible and do not change an animals DNA sequence, but they can change how the body reads a DNA sequence.
Since environment and behaviors, nutrition, stress, exercise, can all result in epigenetic changes, it is easy to see the connection between genes, behaviors and environment.
For example, mice that were exposed to a pleasant fruity odour were given electric foot shocks at the same time, therefore becoming fearful when smelling that odour. Those mice were then mated and their offspring as well as future generations were fearful of that odour even though they had never had any previous dealings with it. These epigenetic changes passed down from not only parents to offspring but from one generation to the next, for survival and effectively giving parents a way to prime their children for a specific environment. This shows how environment influences genes. What we do influences the behaviour of not only the animal infront of us but their future offspring! So what are we HUMANS doing to the XL bully as well as other dogs!
Lets take the mother of XL Bully pups, exposed to all different types of stressors and negative experiences to HUMANS, trauma, fear etc througout development in her environment, lack of socialisation and becomes fearful to certain stimuli. She then passes these on to numerous future generations of her pups. Or we have a female/male XL Bully that encounters repeatedly unpleasant experiences with male HUMANS, or negative experiences with noises or smells, paraded around for the kennel bloodline pics on insta to look the biggest and baddest to bring in the cash, but yet kept away all day in their kennels and never socialised to anything else in the world, such as dogs, HUMANS or environmental stimuli. Their behaviours are suppressed when they react to certain stimil througout adolescence so becomes fearful and startles to them. They are bred from, they then pass this set of info onto all of the pups. This is how species adapt and survive. It is now a contributing factor in why the next set of pups are wary or fearful of men, kids, smells, whatever the experiences were.
The environment and the HUMANS influenced this. But thats the good thing with epigentics, we can influence and use the environment for good, the right upbringing and associations, the right diet, positive experiences, and help change those negative experiences.
So genetics is not as simple as its made out. Environmental and HUMAN influences have an enormous effect on behaviour and temperament. But if we can influence gene expression and make a mess then we can do the reverse and create good.
In regards to traits when looking at the biological basis of behaviour, taking the Tinburgen approach and looking at the phylogeny, ontogeny, function and the proximate mechanism is a more practical way to also add in when looking at behaviour. How does a trait develop? What is the traits evolutionary history? What is the structure of the trait? How have the traits variations influenced fitness for the animals survival? As we may have domesticated dogs, but their behaviour is still the same of their ancestors. If we left them alone and stopped dabbling with them, the changes to their behaviour that we engineer would eventually disappear. All those thinking aggression is a trait the same as retrieving, and about aggression being genetically tied to the XL Bully, it's we HUMANS that engineered traits. But aggression is not a trait. However, when we remove ourselves from the equation I very much doubt a Pointer is going to stand and point when he wants to fill his belly or my little Cocker is going to go retrieve and bring back for the rest of my gang and go without his dinner. It's us, the HUMANS who influence our dogs. Dogs are about survival! We domesticated them and we engineered. Remove us and remove the problem! Or change us, educate us, guide us and help fix the problem! Blame the correct side of the lead!
The nature/nurture debate has been argued since time began and will continue to be argued. Its not Genetics or Environment. THEY BOTH WORK TOGETHER. Good dogs are bred and raised so why waste time arguing, why are we not doing both? Get rid of the fertility clinics, get rid of the s***m deliveries, get rid of the back yard breeders, hit the human? Why are we going down a repeated road of ripping loving family dogs out of homes in the name of BSL again? Why are we blaming the dogs? The ones we need to target are the HUMANS who will move on to the next breed and create something else! This does not solve the issue.
As an expert witness for the courts who deals with the DDA and bite incidents, working in rescue and also rehabbing, I have experience of all breeds. I work with those dogs labelled aggressive, the ones who are being euthanised at the vets, the last chance dogs. The abused and the ones who have endured trauma. The ones who have been in kennels for years. I have the privilege of living with and rehabilitating breeds mentioned in some of the articles and posts being shared related to aggression, such as the Malinios, Kangal, Cocker. And my others, Anatolian, German Shepherd, variety of the small ones, Rotties, and more. I have worked with the mastiffs, the presas, cane corsos, and the bullbreeds, and many other breeds. And the common denominator I have found in all the issues has been the HUMAN.
I am seeing Adam Watts' name being dragged in comments, posts and tv, people taking their interviews to papers. People in the dog world using his incident to further their own agenda and I find it disgusting. As someone who dealt with the scene, had to remove dogs from the kennels, had Adams own family dog live here with me, and pass to rainbow bridge only a few months later knowing how hard that was for his family. And still have a dog who suffered severe trauma endured from that day living with me, it's truly disgusting to see facts and words twisted to suit agendas because they don't know the ins and outs so have to fill in the gaps. It has taken over a year and a half to try work through the mental and emotional trauma of that day, its been difficult.
A lot of people in the dog world are jumping on the XL Bully ban to further their own agendas and making themselves look like the good guy when in actual fact again its all about ego, cashing in and being the name out there! It's time the whole dog industry was regulated. From kennels, trainers, rescues, experts allowed on tv and papers to be fact checked. Its a sh*t show of egos as always. HUMANS are the problem. Regulations are needed across the board.
